Joshua Stephens

Joshua Stephens is a writer, coffee obsessive, a veteran of numerous social movements, direct action coordinator, and long-term world traveler. Born in the U.S. and raised largely in Sicily, he has studied in the autonomous Zapatista communities in Chiapas, Mexico, participated in the International Solidarity Movement in Palestine, played various roles in the “Occupy Wall Street” movement in the U.S., and was once listed as a “terrorist on the payroll of the CIA and the Vatican” in the official newspaper of the Myanmar military junta back in 1998.  Joshua is a former board member of the Institute for Anarchist Studies and has published stories and interviews with Arab anarchists from Palestine, Egypt, and Syria in the wake of the Arab Spring.  He has also covered anti-fascist organizing and the popular assemblies in Greece during the anti-austerity protests, and he has published an autobiographical book on his life in Washington, DC as a professional dog-walker that is simultaneously a series of humorous vignettes and a searing critique of the establishment.  Today, he primarily writes on themes relating to anti-fascism, often documenting social movements and critical histories at the intersections of what is conventionally seen as apolitical aspects of life.  For example, his writing has appeared in some of the world’s top coffee journals, like Standart, as well as the UK football quarterly The Blizzard.  As he travels the world, he also works as a freelance writer, editor, and content-creator for various startups and anti-racist organizations.  He has spent the majority of the past 2 years in Bangkok, Thailand, documenting the pro-democracy uprising there.